Ignorance Isn't Bliss (True Story)

Chapter 1: Meeting Him

I started high school when I just turned 13 years old. Already, I was younger than all of my peers and had at least one year less of life experiences than everyone else. That put me off to a great start. Because my grade was the largest my high school had ever had, I was the youngest in a class of 1,068 students. Naturally, I was less mature and very ignorant. Though growing up around older kids, had actually forced me to mature faster.

Going into high school, I was nervous just like everyone around me. I only knew a handful of people, but that didn't matter because we drifted off fairly quickly after our freshman year. Though it didn't greatly impact me. That sort of thing happened to most people, I knew that back then. And by sophomore year, I had already found my clique.

I hate the word clique; it became a dirty word that movies would use to describe the group of mean girls at the center of the cafeteria. If you aren't from the United States, let me be the first or the hundredth person to break it to you, but it's nothing like the movies. Rather, it's a slap to the face to those of us that had hope that it would be like the movies. I was one of those people that held a large sum of hope, all the way through senior year. So I translated that misguided potential to something that was worth much more of my time: writing.

Just as I'm sure it is for everyone, writing became an escape for me. Something that real life couldn't grant me, my writing did. To this day I don't know if it's a healthy thing to do, but I don't care, because it works!

On a particular December day of my sophomore year, it was raining in the usual sunny parts of southern California. It was a day I'd never forget, because it just so happened to be my best friend Alice's birthday. It was her sweet 16. That meant that at the time, I was 15 getting ready to turn 16.

Alice had been my friend since the third grade. We went through elementary school, middle school, and high school together. Although she'd gone to a different high school at first, I was lucky to have her from 10th grade and onwards.

That particular day, Alice carried balloons and a couple of gifts because it was an American tradition to rub it in everyone's face that it was your birthday even though nobody really cared. I was one of those people that got sucked into that vacuum of uselessness. I never understood why it mattered that we showcase our day of birth to almost 4,000 strangers.

After school that day, the two of us went out to the front to get picked up by our parents. The way the entrance to our school was, made it impossible for anyone to not be in direct line of the sun. So because there weren't any roofs for us to wait under, Alice and I had to huddle up under a small slated platform close to the entrance to the theatre department. We'd have to move out into the rain if anyone had to enter or exit the building that way. It happened a lot, so we were rained on quite a bit.

Alice had an umbrella because she was always prepared, but she still joined me under the platform as a good friend would. She was the sweetest little thing; couldn't harm anyone even with her words.

Like an id*ot, I saw the clouds in the sky that morning and thought to myself, oh, it won't rain today; it never does in L.A.

Alice and I had been talking about the plans she had for her birthday party this weekend. She wanted to have a large gathering at her dad's place. And she was planning on wearing a large, puffy, strapless blue dress like Cinderella with a sparkly tiara to match.

"I hope you're inviting that guy," I playfully nudged her shoulder. Her bulging overcoat made it impossible for me to make a dent with my elbow.

Alice rolled her eyes, "Which one?" she teased.

I shrugged, "I don't know, so long as you invite someone for me," I joked.

Then, in the midst of our conversation, a tall, slender, young man approached us, getting uncomfortably close due to his lack of an umbrella. He was already wet from the rain, and his carelessness in jumping right into our personal space already annoyed the both of us.